Saturday, 30 April 2016

In an honorable attempt to make air travel slightly less terrible, Delta announced a new program this week that will track of checked baggage via paper RFID tags.

The program will replace the familiar barcode stickers that currently get slapped on checked baggage, and RFID readers at various points along a bag's journey will read the tag's radio signals to insure each piece of luggage is on headed to the right place. Delta expects to equip 344 airports with RFID readers by the end of August and while a system like this has been in the works for years, Delta claims they are the first to implement it at such a large scale.

Delta also claims it already has a 95 percent accuracy rate when it comes to routing bags, but it hopes to hit the near-perfect 99.9 percent once the radio tags are implemented. Still, as the world's second-largest airline with over 180 million customers per year, that means 18,000 unlucky people could potentially find themselves standing alone at one of Delta's carousels, wondering where their luggage is.

European decision-makers have been forcibly capping mobile roaming charges in the region for several years now. The last mandated reduction came into effect in July 2014, but today the European Commission has made calls, texts and megabytes that much cheaper once again. The maximum a carrier can now charge you for answering a voice call when you're roaming in another EU country is €0.0114 per minute. Similarly, €0.05 per minute for an outgoing call, €0.02 per SMS and €0.05 per megabyte are the maximum charges you can expect on top of what you'd pay at home.

The new roaming caps introduced today, alongside stricter European net neutrality rules, will also be the last such reduction. That's because from June 15th next year, the concept of roaming will cease to exist, at least among EU carriers and their customers. In the UK, Tesco Mobile is giving its users a transient taste of this level of freedom over the summer, by scrapping roaming charges across Europe until early September.

Blend4Web Team writes: We are glad to present a new version of Blend4Web, the platform for creating interactive 3D Web content. In this release you'll find preliminary support for gamepads and game controllers, new features in the logic editor, reflection for transparent objects and new options for the particle system.

Lubos Lenco writes: Hello! I wrote an introduction of project integrating modern 3D game engine into Blender that I have been working on for a while now. There is still plenty of work ahead, but if this is something of interest to you, the read is available here: 3D Game Engine Introduction The engine is [...]

For some people, the RunKeeper coach's voice is enough to keep them motivated during a jog. Others need something physical to keep pace with. That's where Puma's BeatBot comes in. Developed by a NASA robotics engineer, a trio of MIT students and Puma's ad agency, the robot follows lines around a track at any pace you'd want, according to Fast Company. It can even match Usain Bolt's 2009 foot-speed world record of 44.6 KPH (27.7 MPH) in case you need something a little more aspirational than an eight-minute mile.

The robot works by scanning lines on the track with an array of nine IR sensors, while wheel rotations are monitored via Arduino to keep track of speed and distance. BeatBot's also outfitted with LED lights on the back and dual GoPro cameras. If you figured this would be expensive, you're right. Even though there isn't an exact price, for now, BeatBot will only be offered to Puma-sponsored teams and athletes. Until that changes, you'll just have to make due the old fashioned way: finding a faster running buddy.

As most Phoronix readers will certainly recall, Microsoft bought out Xamarin, the company co-founded by Miguel de Icaza and focused around Mono technologies, and last month announced they would open-source the Xamarin SDK. Microsoft is making good on their word this week...

Darshan Shankar has been working on bringing computer screens into a VR environment for two years, and on Thursday his BigScreen software will launch on Steam for the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift. Beta testers have been using it for a couple of months, but once it launches anyone with those VR headsets (and a powerful PC) will have access for free. Users can bring anything that displays on their normal Windows desktop to screens in virtual reality, with up to four people sharing one environment at a time. It uses positional audio to let users talk to each other within VR, but shared audio from the desktops is a feature that will arrive later, along with customizable avatars and Vive controller support.

In a Reddit thread announcing the release, Shankar explains that its bandwidth and hardware requirements depend on the resolution users select, and how many people they're sharing an environment with. Streams are peer-to-peer and encrypted, and there's no latency for a viewer looking at their own screen. To stream a monitor in 1080p to three other people could require a 5 - 10Mb connection, for example. In the future, he envisions charging for upgrades on things like avatars and environments while the core product remains free, like Skype.

If you play PC games, you surely know of Steam. If you aren't such a gamer, please know that it is a video game delivery and management platform for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It is a great way to purchase games, and unlike using Microsoft's Windows Store, games can take full advantage of your hardware. Valve is not satisfied with Steam only being for games, you see, and the company is focusing on other media too. Today, Valve announces that Lionsgate movies will be distributed through its delivery solution. More than 100 films, including the wildly popular Hunger Games series, will be available… [Continue Reading]

Monday, 25 April 2016

VirtualBox is a great tool for trying out some new Linux distro, but you’ll usually have to spend a while finding a download and setting up your VM and operating system, first. OSBoxes.org makes life easier by providing 40+ prebuilt VirtualBox (VDI) and VMware images for Android x86, CentOS, Debian, Fedora, FreeBSD, Gentoo, Linux Mint, Remix OS, Ubuntu and many more. Just browsing the website might give you some ideas. If you’re intrigued by the name "Chromixium", for instance, clicking a link to the official site will explain that it’s "the best of Chromium with the power of Ubuntu" (aka… [Continue Reading]

Although the Raspberry Pi has undergone numerous refreshes since it launched three years ago, its first official accessory -- a 5-megapixel Omnivision camera module -- has remained the same. That's mostly due to the Raspberry Pi Foundation and its partners buying a huge amount of sensors, which not only kept the price low, but also enabled it to have plenty of stock for years to come. According to CEO Eben Upton, those reserves are now running very low, so it's time to show off the new merchandise: two new $25 (£19) cameras powered a Sony IMX219 8-megapixel sensor.

Like many of the big smartphone and tablet makers, the Raspberry Pi Foundation is utilizing Sony's mobile imaging smarts for its new visible-light and infrared cameras. The IMX219 has a fixed-focus sensor and is capable of outputting 3280 x 2464 photos and 1080p HD video at 30fps. Upton says it was chosen for its impressive image quality, colour fidelity and low-light performance, which plays nicely with the Raspberry Pi's Videocore IV GPU after some specialist tuning by former Broadcom imaging engineer Naush Patuck.

As is normally the case with any new Raspberry Pi launch, the hardware retains the same price (before taxes) as its predecessor. The visible-light and infrared cameras are available now from RS Components and Element 14, with more resellers set to follow "soon."

The arrival of Bash in Windows 10 took many people by surprise, but it opens up a number of opportunities including the ability to run GUI Linux apps. But it’s about much more than just that. Microsoft wants people who are confused about the arrival of (deep breath…) Bash on Ubuntu on Windows to know

We’ve mentioned before that some early USB-C cables aren’t built to specification and could damage your hardware . Turns out, the same may be true of some phones that include a USB-C port and support Qualcomm’s QuickCharge 3.0 technology.

Wednesday, 20 April 2016

Communications giant Huawei has revealed its vision for 2016 at its annual analyst summit (HAS), with a focus on the Internet of Things (IoT), virtual reality, and 5G internet. The Chinese firm was one of the first to begin 5G tests, working with Japanese wireless carrier NTT Docomo last year on field tests. It expects... Read more »

Monday, 18 April 2016

To be successful at Counter-Strike, you need tremendous reflexes and hand-eye coordination. That's why the shooter has always thrived on PC, where players can use tricked out monitors, keyboards and mice. In comparison, if there's one platform that's ill-suited for the game, it has to be Android. Still, that hasn't stopped one plucky developer from making a port anyway. It's based on Counter-Strike 1.6 -- Global Offensive will have to wait -- and requires not only a copy of the original game, but also some technical trickery. If you're up to the challenge, you can grab the APK here.

Creator Alibek Omarev has posted a video of the game running on an Android tablet. It looks, well, just as fiddly as you might expect. The screen is littered with tiny touchscreen controls -- these are fully customisable, Omarev explains on Reddit -- and there's a tremendous amount of slowdown. Regardless, it shows what can be done on Android hardware these days. To make the game truly playable, however, you might want to try connecting a Bluetooth keyboard or gamepad. Unless you're happy to lope around the map and take an endless stream of headshots, that is.

Saturday, 16 April 2016

When it comes to CPU workloads, stunning in our Linux distribution comparisons has been Intel's Clear Linux distribution. This Intel Open-Source Technology Center project has led many of our distribution / OS comparisons with Intel engineers investing heavily in performance optimizations via AutoFDO, LTO-optimized binaries, aggressive compiler flags by default, and more. But how does the OpenGL performance compare for Clear Linux? Here are some graphics benchmarks and in select cases the results are quite a surprise.

Jerod went solo on this show to talk with Andrew Cantino about Huginn, a system for building agents that perform automated tasks for you online. They can read the web, watch for events, and take actions on your behalf. Think of it as a hackable Yahoo! Pipes plus IFTTT on your own server.

Friday, 15 April 2016

This library is just a proof-of-concept of the windows kernel-mode drivers, which can be written in Rust programming language. It contains the types, constants and bindings for the Windows Driver Kit with target OS starting from Windows XP (x86/x64). Neat proof-of-concept.

Arduino is the perfect introduction to microcontrollers and electronics. The recent trend of powerful, cheap, ARM-based single board Linux computers is the perfect introduction to computer science, programming, and general Linux wizardry. Until now, though, Arduino and these tiny ARM computers have been in two different worlds. Now, finally, there are nightly builds of Arduino IDE on the Raspberry Pi and other single board Linux computers.

The latest Arduino build for ARM Linux popped up on the arduino.cc downloads page early this week. This is the result of an incredible amount of work from dozens of open source developers across …read more

Linux apps running in Windows 10? What gives?! As if the arrival of Bash on Ubuntu on Windows 10 wasn't enough, people have been quick to investigate the capabilities and limitation of Microsoft's embracing of the Linux command line. Some commenters on our how-to guide asked what the point is. How about being able to run Linux apps in Windows without having to resort to using a virtual machine? It can be done. Here's how. As noted over on Windows Clan, all it takes is a couple of commands to get started. You'll have to begin by making sure you… [Continue Reading]

Saturday, 9 April 2016

Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found. I use ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so. But I might be wrong.

According to the popcon results for spl-linux, there are 1019 Debian installations, or 0.53% of the population, with the package installed. As far as I know the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS installation on Linux in Debian. In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian the ZFS feature is already available, and there the popcon results for zfsutils show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of the population. So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.

As if getting out of the way of a 200mph train isn't hard enough as it is, let's go for bonus difficulty by making it almost invisible. The next time you are visiting Japan, and you see your reflection approaching really fast, get the hell off the railroad tracks. Not content with 200mph bullet trains, Japan is set to get an 'invisible' train. The carriages will be coated in a semi-reflective surface, making it appear to almost disappear. Japanese architect Kazuyo Sejima was commissioned by the Seibu Group to design a new version of the firm's Red Arrow commuter train for the company's 100th anniversary. Seibu Group said that the train would be the first designed by Sejima, and that the design aimed to be 'soft' and 'blend into the landscape.' Comments

Every programmer and person who’s tried learning to code looks up code snippets to find the best way to develop their programs. Bing’s there to help now, with over 80 common code examples that can be edited and executed in your search results.

Thursday, 7 April 2016

Does anyone think this guy is the creator of bitcoin? If so, why did it take so long to produce evidence that he is Satoshi Nakamoto? There are just so many questions, I don't know if I'll believe anyone claiming to be the father of bitcoin. Now, according to sources speaking to FT, Wright has made "conditional approaches" to media organizations and other institutions to brief them on an "big reveal" where Wright claims he will finally prove conclusively that he is Nakamoto by performing a "cryptographic miracle." Comments

Following last week's announcement of Canonical and Microsoft working together to bring Ubuntu's user-space with Bash to Windows 10 in user-space using a new Windows 10 Linux subsystem, the preliminary support is now available with the latest Windows Insider update...

Tuesday, 5 April 2016

Hideo Kojima will receive this year’s Development Legend prize at the Develop Industry Excellence Awards on Wednesday, July 13th.

The award recognises his decades of visionary game design – most notably through his flagship Metal Gear Solid series, but also on Zone of the Enders, Boktai and his early titles such as Snatcher and Policenauts.

Famous for nearly 30 years of work at Japanese publisher Konami, Kojima joined the firm in 1986 – just one year before the debut of Metal Gear. While he contributed to countless other franchises, it was the adventures of Solid Snake that truly put Kojima on the map, particularly with the the seminal Metal Gear Solid in 1998.

Last year, Kojima and Konami parted ways after reported disagreements between the two that led to his name being removed from the marketing material for Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain and the dissolution of his Kojima Productions studio.

In December, he re-emerged at the head of a revitalised and independent Kojima Productions and is currently working on an exclusive game for PlayStation 4 as part of a new partnership with Sony.

Kojima will collect the award in person at The Develop Awards 2016 on Wednesday, July 13th, presented by fellow Development Legend and long time friend Mark Cerny.

He joins the list of elite developers who have been awarded this prestigious accolade over the years, with previous recipients including Tim and Chris Stamper, Mark Cerny, Tim Sweeney, Mark Rein, David Perry, Peter Molyneux, David Braben, Charles Cecil, Phil Harrison and Ian Livingstone.

“Hideo Kojima is the epitome of a Development Legend – few developers reach the stage where their own name becomes as famous as their franchise,” said Develop editor James Batchelor.

“While hundreds of people have contributed to the success of Metal Gear Solid, it is Kojima’s vision that has driven the series and established him as one of the most ambitious games developers in the world.

“His ongoing work to push the boundaries of game design is inspiring. We are truly honoured to have him attending the awards, and look forward to celebrating his legacy this July.”

Kojima will also keynote the Develop: Brighton conference, organised by Tandem Events, in a fireside chat with Cerny.

Monday, 4 April 2016

Blend4Web Team writes: Earlier this month you were introduced to our big game which demonstrates the possibilities of Blend4Web in game development. We are glad to announce that all source files for this game are available to study and modify as part of the open source Blend4Web SDK starting with this version. In this release [...]